


Nothing Gold Can Stay

by ChloeWinchester



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, F/M, Historian Belle, Immortal Rumple, Rating will change, Warnings Will Change
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-20
Updated: 2016-04-20
Packaged: 2018-06-03 11:20:52
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,038
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6608743
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChloeWinchester/pseuds/ChloeWinchester
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Belle French is on a mission to restore the ancient and crumbling gravesites of Storybrooke's oldest families. The one resistance to her project is a man named Mr. Gold, whose reputation alone should be cause for alarm. Upon meeting, however, the two strike a deal, and Belle comes to realize just how deep these graves may go.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nothing Gold Can Stay

**Author's Note:**

> Based on the prompt given by repeatinglitanies (tumblr)

There is such a thing as living too long. The first extra lifetime showed him that much. The centuries upon centuries that followed were no better. He learned very quickly, over and over again, everything was utterly meaningless. Having everything was equal to having nothing. Power felt good, wealth was a means to an end and all inbetween was so fleeting and vapid it wasn’t worth paying attention to. When eternity was waiting to spit in one’s face it was difficult to take joy in anything at all. Even having people, loved ones, was pointless and only led to unnecessary pain. Anguish, pure agony that could be avoided. It had to be avoided or this neverending life would be that much longer. Decades of dragging oneself over glass and salt and acid that ate at the nerves until feeling was nothing. 

No, mortal lives were too short. Flashes in a pain, more frequent than weather, regimes, economies, wars, seasons. Flickers, embers that faded with time in front of his eyes like a stiff November wind had come and snuffed them out. He’d seen storms that lasted longer than some lives.

When forever awaits, gloating, smug and bloated with glee at any pain endured, everything is nothing, nothing is one’s personal everything. He hated time more than he hated himself, and it took a grand feat for that to happen. Centuries had caused that, hadn’t it? People couldn’t bring light to an eternal life, only bring in flashes of it, a camera capturing a singular moment, then it’s gone. Emptiness, isolation, loneliness and a constant application of thicker and thicker mortar to the walls around the heart is what kept him safe, and mildly sane. 

Things were easier to have around. If cared for they endured far longer than people. Emotionless, silent things used to fill up space. Characteristics bestowed on these things handled with practiced care and practiced hands helps. A temporary balm to an ever-pursuing problem. 

The art of keeping people beyond an arm’s length helped as well. The world had been against him all his life, fighting and kicking him while he was down, beating him when helpless, why shouldn’t he lash out now? Why shouldn’t he get to enact revenge on this horrific nightmare of a world for all it had done to him? 

An air of superiority, a mask of indifference and enough power over the populace -to an intermediate degree-, sharp words, a general curt nature to passerby and being entirely private with his ambiguous existence kept the locals precisely where he wanted them: Stewing in their own rumors and gossip until they were spongy and crumbling with it like moss in a hot bog. He was noticed, but anonymous, and they left him alone. 

Surrounded by quiet things in his silent shop restoring what he could with careful, deft hands, glass and metal keeping him two feet from the populace who came through, Mr. Gold refused to collect anymore ghosts. 

Enough rested nearby, and he planned to neglect them until they faded just like everything else did. All but one. 

Just one.

Not that any of it was anyone’s business at all, despite what that pesky pixie of a woman prowling around and soliciting him at every turn with letters and phone calls thought. 

The bell above the door chimed and he glanced up, looking more steadily immediately. The girl walking toward him was...breathtaking. 

“Hello, Mr. Gold,” she said brightly. “I, um, I’m Belle French. I was wondering if I could have just a moment of your time?” 

He let out a little laugh, shaking his head. Oh, that woman was getting much, much craftier.

~*~ 

Belle got on her knees, closely inspecting the stone in front of her. Gloved fingertips passed over raised grain and dots of moss, a tiny brush dusting away the dirt and debris of years passed, trying to suss out the name etched into it eons ago. 

The earth beneath her was damp and slowly sinking, the scent of it carried across the quiet, lonely place around her. The sky above was gray, spotted with bits of sunlight that made it through the silkscreen briefly to cast a shadow before it slipped away again. The scent of dirt carried on the chilled wind coming out of the east, winter’s last talon still clawing its way in while Spring attempted to usher it along. 

Darker clouds over the hill promised rain to neighboring towns but she doubted they would see storms tonight, which was a bit of a disappointment. Nothing she liked more than reading during a storm, except perhaps moments like this one. 

Her brush stilled.

“...Mills,” she breathed, a smile blooming on her face, the pink in her cheeks from the chilled wind. “I found them, Madame Mayor!” 

She straightened up, dusting the dirt off her knees and standing proudly before the headstone. Regina looked toward her, leaning against her car with her bored son beside her, reading while she spoke into her phone and pet his hair. 

“I knew they were around here somewhere,” she grinned, hanging up and walking toward her. “How many, do  you think?” 

Belle looked around, taking off her gloves. “This whole row, I think. Most of the carving shape is all the same, and the detail in there is only something a family like yours could afford.” She smiled at her. “Now, did you want to pay for the restoration or have the historical society buy them?” 

“I can pay for them,” she assured, getting out her checkbook and propping it on another grave as she wrote. Belle winced distastefully, glancing toward Henry, who was slumping further and further down the car  as boredom set in. 

“How many more plots to you have until you can begin?” Regina asked, not looking up as she wrote. 

“Just one,” Belle sighed, looking toward the corner of the cemetery, where vines and brambles had overtaken most of the cracked stones, the gnarled tree beside it twisting around so much it was almost as if they were encased. One was cleared, pristine and able to be tended to accordingly, but the rest were left to decay in shadow. 

Regina let out a snort. “Gold?” Belle nodded. “Good luck with that. That man is the most unyielding, stubborn and vindictive bastard I’ve ever met. And I married Sheriff Swan.” She chuckled in her throat and passed the check to her, which Belle took graciously and tucked into the leatherbound portfolio tucked into her bag. 

“That’s what people tell me. I asked Ms. Bleu if anyone had gone to see him personally and she said no, so… I’ve got to try.” She gave a hopeful smile that Regina shook her head at. 

“Good luck, honey,” she smiled, walking back to her car, motioning for Henry to get inside, which the ten year old was very thankful for. 

Belle sighed and began to gather her things. “Oh and don’t let that beast too close!” Regina called, gaining her attention again. The mayor grinned at her, holding her car door open. “He bites.” 

She watched the car disappear down the unkempt gravel before resuming her task. She’d heard something like that from nearly every person she’d spoken with about Mr. Gold. 

A hardened, bordering tyrannical landlord and a ruthless pawnshop owner. No one knew where he came from before he was in Storybrooke, no one even knew his first name. He was a myth here. A legend, a ghost only appearing the first or fifteenth of the month to collect his sums and disappear again into the shop. 

“You ever read  _ Needful Things _ ?” Ruby had asked her when trying to describe the man. 

“Of course I have,” she’d returned, poking at the leftover crust of her pie while Granny’s bustled around her. 

“He’s like that guy,” she said, leaning on the counter in front of her. 

“Satan?” Belle had balked. 

“Oh yeah. Definitely. Pretty sure the kids tell ghost stories about him,” she smirked. 

Belle rolled her eyes. “He cannot be that bad.” 

But everyone said, almost unanimously, that yes, he was. A monster, a fiend, rumors that he’d murdered his wife and chopped up her lover, abandoned his child in a far away land, even stolen a baby like a demon of old. Small town superstition, that was all. A rumor getting wildly out of hand.

She shook her head, gathering her things from the base of the headstone and headed back to her car. She wasn’t one to listen to nonsense without seeing things for herself.  .

All Belle wanted was to restore the first cemetery of Storybrooke and get it licensed as a historic landmark, what harm could there be in that? 

~*~ 

“You’re going alone?” 

This was a mistake. Why did she do this? Papa’s shop would’ve been open after she’d gone to Mr. Gold, why did she stop by beforehand? 

She sighed, looking up from the arrangement she was helping him work on. “Papa, what’s he going to do in broad daylight?” 

“You’ve never dealt with him. Don’t brush it off like that,” he spat gruffly. “Despicable man. He reeks of evil, Belle, you can see it in his eyes. Little bastard may as well be the devil himself.” 

Belle turned her eyes back to the daffodils. “So church has been going well for you, then?” 

“Come with me Sunday and find out,” he retorted. “Might clear your head a little bit.” 

She frowned, looking up at her father, who was counting up the register. “What does that mean?” 

He looked at her wearily, his ‘I know best’ look. She pursed her lips, her heart already so tired of this conversation from having it at least a hundred times over. “It means that maybe you’d get your priorities straight and really start investing in your future.” 

“My future with Gaston, you mean,” she bit back. “You think God is somehow miraculously going to make me fall in love with him?”

“I didn’t say that.” 

“Then what are you saying?” She demanded, jaw set. 

“I’m saying that it’s time you settled down, Belle. These side projects and things you’re doing are great hobbies, but...it’s not a life. Settling down with someone like Gaston, who can take care of you and be beneficial for the both of us for the rest of your life, is the smart thing to do. You’ve always been clever, Belle, you should understand this better.” 

“Hobbies? My  _ two _ government jobs, those are hobbies to you? Trying to keep this city in tact and bring in more revenue so small businesses like this one don’t get shut down for lack of foot traffic and running a library, that’s just hobbies to you? This is my life, Papa.  _ My _ life. Not yours. I know Gaston can set up that land offer for you, but I’m not something to be traded for land and property ownership. I’m a person, not a piece of cattle.” 

She tied the bow around the vase with a sharp sound and picked up her bag, stalking toward the door. “I’m not someone’s prize, Father. I’m not a toy or a trade good, I’m your daughter. I don’t want to marry Gaston Legume, I don’t want anything to do with him. And that’s it.” She checked her phone for the time, keeping her lips pursed so her tears didn’t find her eyes. “I wish that my happiness was more important to you than that.” 

“Belle, of course I want you to be happy, more than anything, but I also want you to be taken care of,” he said, frustrated and guilty all at once. “I just want what’s best for you, and it doesn’t get much better than him.” 

She shook her head, checking her phone again. “I have to go before the shop closes. I’ll talk to you later.” She pushed the door open 

“You really shouldn’t go alone,” he said, an edge to his voice now that she clearly wasn’t listening. “Let me go with you, or Gaston, he shouldn’t be far off.” 

“Despite what you think I can take care of myself.” She let the door close behind her, taking firm steps as she moved down the street toward the pawn shop, trying to put on her smile and endearing nature before going to speak with Mr. Gold. 

She was ready for a demon, ready for some sort of vile monster who would hiss and snarl at her in the shadows. 

What she saw instead was an incredibly handsome man diligently working at restoring a silver necklace. 

It threw her for a moment, until he looked at her. She smiled, mask in place and walked up to him, trying not to note the colors in his hair and the brandy tint to his eyes. She had a job to do. 

“Hello, Mr. Gold,” she said brightly. “I, um, I’m Belle French. I was wondering if I could have just a moment of your time?” 

The beat of silence that followed was a tremulous one. He looked at her with a piercing, wolfish gaze, a smile finally spreading across his face followed by an amused chuckle that broke the tension and had Belle’s heart skipping about a little. 

“Is this the new tactic, then?” He asked, and again she was thrown. His voice was soft but rumbling, a growl hidden in a whisper. “Send a beautiful girl to try and force my hand?” He clicked his tongue, chastising her. “I thought Ms. Bleu might be more tactful than that.” 

“A-actually she told me not to come,” she smiled, steeling herself. “In fact, just about everyone I knew told me not to come and speak with you, Mr. Gold.” 

“Mm, well they would,” he said, grinning ambiguously. “So out with it, dearie, let’s hear what you’ve prepared.” 

She rolled her eyes. “Well you’re more charming than they said,” she teased, smirking at him. He looked at her again, intrigued. “All we… I want to do is restore your family property. That’s it. You don’t have to do a thing but pay us if you want the rights to them or we can pay you for them.” 

“Why the cemetery?” He said, avoiding the question. “Of all the places in Storybrooke, why that one?” 

“I saw how much the graves needed to be looked at, saw how they were falling apart, and I didn’t think it fair to the people buried there to let them be forgotten like that,” she said truthfully. He softened a touch. 

“Noble,” he nodded sincerely. “Did you ever wonder if some of those people deserve to be forgotten?” 

Belle frowned. “What do you mean?” 

“Well, not everyone is a good person, Miss French. People can have dark, hateful souls in them and they don’t deserve to have their memory live on. Wouldn’t you agree?” 

She watched him, thinking over her answer. “No. In that instance it’s not about honoring them, it’s about learning from your family’s mistakes, righting the wrong. Things like that shouldn’t be forgotten.” 

He smiled again, the edge gone to his gaze that he returned to the necklace. “Be that as it may, Miss French, I respectfully disagree, and decline the offer to restore the gravesites. What’s dead is long gone and will not be coming back. Having those reminders made fresh is not something I would wish upon the world or myself.” 

Belle frowned. “Because the family members you have there were bad people?” 

“I would assume so,” he muttered. “Not as if I met them, eh dearie?” His smile made her heart patter again and she laughed softly at his quip. 

“What if...what if I do some research on them? Find out everything I can and see if what I find changes your mind?” She said hopefully. He looked at her again, amused once more. 

“Are you offering me a deal, Ms. French?” He asked quietly, a dark mischief playing in his eyes that thrilled her rather than frightening her. 

“I am,” she said, assured. She held her head up and squared her shoulders. “You give me one week to try and change your mind. If I don’t, I drop the issue and try to get the landmark status with your gravesites as is. But if I do, even just a little bitty bit, you let me restore them.” 

It was dangerous to allow someone that close to him, but he doubted Belle would be able to decipher the names and dates on the headstones, let alone find anything worthy of research at all. The young lady intrigued him, and admittedly, he did want to spend more time with her. 

He smirked and bowed his head in an honoring nod. “Fine,” he agreed. “One week to change my mind, dearie. I’ll expect progress reports every day, of course.” 

“Of course,” she smiled, holding her hand out to him for him to shake. “Deal?” 

He took it, and Belle was startled by how warm the touch was. “Deal,” he agreed, piercing gaze holding hers, so much so that she felt hypnotized for the briefest of moments. 

She brightened, sliding her card across the counter. “If you have any questions feel free to call me at any time,” she grinned. 

He took it delicately, looking it over in the evening light pouring through the windows. “Thank you. I suppose I’ll see you tomorrow, then, Miss French?” 

She nodded, almost shy under his predatory grin. “Yes, you will. Keep an eye out, Mr. Gold. Pleasure doing business with you.” She turned, her hair bouncing on her shoulders, skirt swaying around her thighs. 

Gold had never been one to believe in any sort of God, but by looking at her, Belle may well have been an angel. He hoped so, anyway. He brought the darkness out in everyone he spoke with, and Belle would be no exception. 

Flickers of light, fleeting moments, not worth it. 

His smile faded with the ringing of the bell at the door, receding into himself again. Isolation. Emptiness. Nothingness. Barriers and fences and guards and walls. It kept him safe from pretty smiles like Belle’s. 

Despite that, he was looking forward to seeing that deceitful smile again tomorrow. 


End file.
